Our timeline
This Timeline is the core/heart of the HOWL website. It traces the development of the Women’s Liberation Movement (WLM) and has links to memories and images contributed by sisters who have been involved in the WLM.
The HOWL timeline currently stretches between 1961 and 1988, with the WLM in the UK really taking off in 1970 in most areas. We think it’s important to trace what led to the explosion of activism in 1970.
The Timeline is very much a work in progress and is waiting to be enriched by memories and images from our sisters. It may be extended beyond 1988 if memories are provided relating to later years.
Click on the red + icon to expand the detail. Where stories exist for a year, a button will appear beside the year entry. Click on the button to read all the the stories for that year.
1961
- 4 December – Launch of the contraceptive pill
(For married women only. Availability was extended to some other women in1967.)
1963
- 9 February – Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique (US) published
1964
- 25 March – Married Women’s Property Act revision
(This Act allowed married women to keep half of any savings they’d made from the allowance paid to them by their husbands. This gave women a little more financial independence, but also provided official recognition that many women were still dependent on their husbands for their income in the first place.)
1965
- Hannah Gavron’s The Captive Wife published (UK)
1966
- 16 June – Black Power Movement started in USA
(A model of a resistance movement.)
1967
- July – The Sexual Offences Act 1967 passed which decriminalised sexual relations between men over twenty-one
(Lesbianism was never illegal in UK but homosexual law reform represented a major cultural shift for all.) - 27 October – Abortion Act 1967 legalised abortion in the UK for women up to 24 weeks pregnant.
(Two consenting doctors had to agree that continuing the pregnancy would be harmful either to the woman’s physical or mental health, or to the child’s physical or mental health when it was born.) - Mothers in Action established by five unsupported mothers
1968
- 7 June – Dagenham Ford machinists went on strike over equal pay
(850 women machinists at the Ford factory in Dagenham went on strike, disputing the classification of their work as unskilled – a label which seemed to justify them being paid less than their male colleagues.)
1969
- January – Redstockings formed in New York
(Was influential in UK.) - February – Jane Arden’s play Vagina Rex and the Gas Oven opened at London’s Arts Lab
- February – Revolutionary Festival, Essex University
(At this conference, where men were in the majority, women agreed to meet separately in London to discuss their lives and future organising as women. ) - Five Women’s Liberation small groups were soon set up in different London boroughs.
(These groups were Tufnell Park, Peckham Rye, Notting Hill, Belsize Lane and Islington. Women from these groups and other individual women set up London’s Women’s Liberation Workshop in 1970.) - May – The National Joint Action Committee on Women’s Rights (NJACCWER)
(A trade union organisation for equal pay and rights, formed out of the Ford strike.) - May – Equal Pay demonstration organised by NJACCWER held in Trafalgar Square, London
- July – Gay Liberation Front founded in New York City inspired by the Stonewall Riots in June
It offered a model of a radical, ‘grass roots’, leaderless movement which inspired many others.) - October – The Divorce Reform Act approved
(This allowed couples to divorce after they had been separated for two years, or for five years if only one of them wanted a divorce. Proof was no longer needed that the breakdown of the relationship was either the husband or wife’s ‘fault’ due to adultery, drunkenness, insanity or desertion. A marriage could now end in divorce so long as it was proved to have ‘irretrievably broken down’.) - 20 November – First Miss World Protest
(Women’s Liberationists and other demonstrated against the Miss World beauty pageant which had been held annually in the UK since 1951. Women wore sashes with re-imagined words, putting ‘Mis’ in front of them – for instance, Mis-Understood, Mis-Represented, Mis-Treated etc.) - First Women’s Liberation Workshop was set up in London
(The London Women’s Liberation Workshop was set up to be an umbrella organisation bringing the growing numbers of small local London women’s liberation groups into regular communication. Regular meetings open to all were held and the Workshop started an occasional magazine with a different local group taking responsibility to devise, write and produce each issue. This magazine/zine published under different names, finally settling on Shrew, and continued until 1978. Around Britain and ??? groups of women began to organise themselves, setting up networks of communication and various forms of publications.) - Bradford Socialist Women’s Action Group started to meet
1970
- Matrimonial Proceedings and Property Act 1970 passed
- Kate Millet’s Sexual Politics published (US and UK)
- 27 February – 1 March – Women’s Liberation Conference held at Ruskin College, Oxford
(Up to 600 women and men attended from all over the country, with a desire to debate a wide variety of issues affecting women. The first four WLM demands were among many topics discussed: Equal pay; Equal educational and job opportunities; Free contraception and abortion on demand; Free 24-hour nurseries.) - February – Leeds women clothing workers went on strike
(After their union accepted a low wage rise that discriminated against women, the women took strike action, when 20,000 women from 45 factories marched in protest.) - 29 May – 1970 Equal Pay Act passed – ‘Equal pay for work of equal value’
- WERC – A campaign against discrimination in education started
- June – Women’s National Co-ordinating Committee (WNCC) set up
(WNCC was proposed at the Oxford conference February 1970 and agreed to at the Sheffield Conference where Terms of Reference for its functioning were adopted. It was devised as a loose coordinating body for the WLM, to which WLM groups could choose to affiliate. WNCC consisted of bi-monthly meetings to which each affiliated group was to send two voting delegates. Issues soon arose relating to the contrasts between women affiliated to left groups, their goals and methods of organisation and the women from the ‘structureless’ groups created by localised consciousness raising. WNCC disbanded after the Skegness national WL Conference in 1971.) - Women in Media founded in London
- October – Shulamith Firestone’s The Dialectic of Sex published (US)
- November – 2nd Miss World Demonstration
(Women’s Liberationists infiltrated Albert Hall with plans to disrupt the procedings. Feminists threw flour-bombs protesting against the objectification of women.The recent film, Misbehaving about that Miss World demonstration came out in early 2020.)
1971
- First gay/lesbian March in London
- Immigration Act 1971: makes it harder for immigrant women to keep their children in the UK, or to send for them once settled
- 8 March Huge INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY demonstration, London
- The first women’s refuge opened, to a blaze of publicity
(Set up in Chiswick by Erin Pizzey. It provided protection for women who were being abused by their husbands and needed a safe place to stay. The women could also bring their children to the refuge with them. Other refuges soon followed.) - 15–17 October – National WLM conference,
(Skegness – The four WLM demands discussed in 1970 at the conference in Oxford were passed in 1971 in Skegness. The WNCC is voted out of existence, as to hierarchical/leftist in structure, in favour of local and regional conferences and organisation.) - UNION OF WOMEN FOR LIBERATION formed, from the Maoist Women’s Liberation Front, which grew out of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB). Seen off by WLM
- Bolton WL group starts
1972
- 25-26 March (Manchester) and November (London) – National WLM conferences were held in Manchester and London.(Debates arose around domestic labour and the ‘need to liberate women from – or as some see it to give just pay for – work done both inside and outside the home.’ The four demands also continued to be debated.)
- Power of Women Collective (POW), London
(Arises from debates at the London WLM conference surrounding Selma James‘s pamphlet, ‘Women, the Unions and Work.’ (Becomes Wages for Housework.) - Group called Radical Feminists (WLW) London starts
- Regional conferences start:
Northeast Regional Women’s Liberation Conference, Leeds
Northeast Regional Women’s Liberation Conference, York
Northeast Regional Women’s Liberation Conference, Leeds - June – First edition of Spare Rib published
(Its mission: ‘There is the most urgent need for a magazine that will reach ALL women – that is, women who are frustrated by the limitations of existing magazines’.) - Red Rag Collective formed
(The magazine was ‘for women in the WLM, and is a forum for debate of issues raised by the WLM’.) - Night Cleaners’ strikes
(Resulted in greater awareness of the cleaners’ (mainly women) working conditions. Unionisation was difficult, especially as cleaning work was increasingly privatised during the 1970s. Film Night Cleaners made by Berwick St Collective.) - Action for Women’s Advice,
(Research and Education (AWARE) (WLW), London.) - London Abortion Action Group begins
(A coalition of autonomous groups with national co-ordination and a newsletter. Fights for free abortion and contraception and against forced sterilisation. (Becomes Women’s Abortion and Contraception Campaign or WACC.)
1973
- National WLM conference, Bristol
(Feminist and WLM member Lee Comer recalls ‘At the Bristol conference I stood up in the plenary and said “Are there any fiction writers here because what we should do is publish our own fiction.” So a few people came forward and we formed a little workshop and then I took it upon myself to collect the stories and stuff and we published it.’ The book was published as Wedlocked Women in 1974.) - Regional conferences:
– North West Regional Women’s Liberation Conference, Lancaster
– South West Regional Women’s Liberation Conference, Reading - And regional specific tendency conferences start:
– Regional Socialist Women WLM Conference, March, Reading
– Second Conference on Marxists in the WLM, September
– Socialist Woman Conference, January, London
– Women’s Liberation and Socialism Conference, Birmingham. On strategy and practice in relation to the WLM.
– Women’s Liberation and Socialism Conference, London. On Autonomy or Separatism?
– Women and Socialism Conference on Day Care, London
– Women and Socialism Conference on the Politics of Sexuality
– WACC National Conference, Liverpool
– (The) Family Conference, Leeds
– Feminist History Conference, London
– One Day Conference on the Future of the WLW, July, London
– Women and Law, London
– Women’s Liberation Literature Collectives Conference, Bristol
– Women’s Studies Conference, Essex
– British Sociological Association (BSA) conference on Sexual Divisions, Aberdeen - First UK Rape Crisis formed
Soon after, a national organisation for England and Wales – a network of centres across the UK that ‘provides co-ordination and support to affiliated member groups and campaigns and lobbies to raise awareness of the issues of sexual violence in the wider community and with local, regional and national government.’ - Brixton Black Women’s Group formed
Campaigned on eg racism in education provision, discriminatory practice of the contraceptive drug Depo Provera being prescribed to black women. The group remained active until 1986. - Virago Press founded by Carmen Callil
In 1974, Ursula Owen joined as a founder director. Set up to ‘drag women’s writing off the sidelines’. - September – Essex Road Women’s centre founded
Opened to public in 1974
1974
- July – National WLM conference, Edinburgh
At this conference, two demands were added to the first four:
– Legal and financial independence for all women
– The right to a self-defined sexuality. An end to discrimination against lesbians - July – First Welsh National Women’s Liberation Conference, Aberystwyth
- National Women’s Aid Federation set up in England
To bring together all the women’s refuges and shelters across the country. Women’s Aid Northern Ireland followed in 1975, and Scottish Women’s Aid in 1976. - 1st national conference in London
Erin Pizzey the basis of the network at this point - WACC National Conference, Nottingham (abortion and contraception)
– Equal Pay Conference, Colchester
– (The) Fifth Demand Conference, London
– Women in the Hotel Industry, London
– Women’s Rights for Employed Women, London
– Working Women’s Charter Campaign (WWCC) National Conference, Leeds
The Working Women’s Charter emerges from the London Trades Council to focus on the work women do outside of the home, on employment and equal opportunity. The Charter’s goals include; a minimum wage, equal education, extended nursery care, maternity leave, free contraception, family allowances and greater trade union participation by women. - Other conferences 1974:
– Childcare, London
– Libertarian Women’s Conference, Leeds
– Need for a National Nursery Campaign, Nottingham
– Structure and Organisation of the Women’s Movement, Coventry
– Woman as a Consumer, York
– Women and Education, Manchester
– Women and Health Conference, Sheffield
– Women’s Health Project, London
– Women in History, Brighton
– Women and Media Conference, Bristol
– Women’s Movement: Problems, Perspective and Possibilities, London
1975
- National WLM conference, Manchester
Women’s Aid a big issue, with many feminists critical of Erin PIzzey’s approach - First NWAF (National Women’s Aid Federation) Conference, London
– Women’s Aid meeting held in Leeds prior to the National WLM Conference in Manchester.
– Second National Women’s Aid (WA) conference, Leeds – split with Erin Pizzey complete. - WIRES is established
Proposed by Leeds Chapeltown Women’s Liberation Group, a national newsletter to inform WL groups of activities and to act as a referral and information service. A resolution is passed to establish The Women’s Liberation Movement National Information Service which is renamed Women’s Information, Referral and Enquiry service (WIRES). The first group to produce the newsletter is the Chapeltown Women’s Liberation Group and it is agreed that publication of the newsletter should be passed to another group after a couple of years. - Equal Pay Act of 1970 goes into effect
- 12 November 1975 – Sex Discrimination Act passed
To ‘render unlawful certain kinds of sex discrimination and discrimination on the ground of marriage, and establish a Commission with the function of working towards the elimination of such discrimination and promoting equality of opportunity between men and women generally; and for related purposes.’ - UN declared it International Year of Women.
- Scottish National Women’s Liberation Conference, Aberdeen
- Welsh National Women’s Liberation Conference, Aberystwyth – unless it was 1974? See above)
- South West Regional Women’s Liberation Conference, Bath
- Fifth Women’s Liberation and Socialism Conference, London: Perspectives on the Women’s Movement.
– Female Sexuality, Brighton.
– (Third) National Lesbian Conference, Lancaster.
– Regional Lesbian Conference, Leeds.
– Women Workers’ Conference (WWCC), Basingstoke.
– Childbirth Conference, Birmingham
– National Abortion Campaign (NAC) National Conference, Glasgow
– NAC National Conference, London
– Nursery and Childcare, Nottingham
– Sexism and Education, Nottingham
– (First) Women and Health Conference, Sheffield (1)
“There was all this stuff about self examination, but just all kinds of information starting to come out about things like contraception and abortion [ … ] It was one of the areas where women would say, ‘Oh gosh, I didn’t know that’, getting that kind of power about themselves.” (Collins, OHP Interview No. 12)
– Women and Health Conference, Manchester (2)
– Women and Media, London
– Women’s Conference to Mobilise Support Against the Use of Torture, London - 12 November – Employment Protection Act
Made statutory maternity pay a requirement for employers, and legislated against dismissal on the grounds of pregnancy. - Family allowances are amalgamated with child tax allowances to create Child Benefits.
- National Abortion Campaign formed
To defend women’s rights to make decisions about their own bodies. - General Synod vote
The administrative body of the Church of England voted that there was ‘no fundamental objection to the ordination of women’. However, women were not actually granted this right until 1992 and the first women were ordained in 1994.
1976
- 9 April – Women’s Therapy Centre set up
- 23-25 April – National WLM conference, Newcastle
Debates over the 6th demand, class and lesbianism, and possibility of a further demand ‘calling on men to share housework and childcare equally.’ - Rape Crisis Scotland set up a centre in Glasgow, and another in Edinburgh in 1978.
- Scottish National Women’s Liberation Conference, St. Andrews
- Scottish National Women’s Liberation Conference, Glasgow
- Equal pay strike at Trico-Folberth factory, Middlesex. The strike goes on for 21 weeks before the women win their demand for the same pay rates as men.
- 26 October – Domestic Violence and Matrimonial Proceedings Act
Enabled married women to obtain a court order against their violent husbands without divorce or separation proceedings. A court could order a man out of the matrimonial home, whether or not he owned it or tenancy was in his name. Problems arose because this protection did not apply to unmarried women. - WOMEN AGAINST RACISM & FASCISM
- LESBIAN LINE
- 23 August 1976-14 July 1976 – Grunwick Film Processing Laboratories strike, Willesden
Workers at the Grunwick Film Processing Laboratories went on strike over unfair dismissals of colleagues, pay inequality and racist company practices. The strike was led by Jayaben Desai and many of the strikers were working-class Asian women. - National WLM conference, London
- London Women’s Conference
– Midlands Regional Women’s Liberation Conference, Birmingham
– North East Regional Women’s Liberation Conference, Leeds
– South West Regional Women’s Liberation Conference, Bristol
– Socialist Feminist Regional Conference, Cambridge
– Socialist Feminist Regional Conference, Sunderland
– Women and Socialism Conference, Bristol
– Radical Feminism Conference, Leeds
– Committee for Lesbian Action Now (CLAN) Conference, Oxford
– International Lesbian Conference, Paris
– National Lesbian Conference, Bristol
Issues: coming out, bisexuality, lesbians and the Working Women’s Charter Campaign (WWCC) and Wages Due Lesbians (Bristol was a centre for Wages For Housework).
– National WWCC Conference, London
– Women and the Cuts (WWCC), London
– Abortion Law Reform Association (ALRA) /A Women’s Right to Choose Conference, London
– Patriarchy Conference, London, 15-16 May. The first WLM conference in Britain to focus on theory rather than campaigns and strategy. Papers presented at the conference were collected and published by Women’s Publishing Collective later that year. The Archive holds 2 copies.
– Federation of Alternative Bookstores’ National Women’s Conference, Birmingham
– Future Directions for the Women’s Movement in Leeds
– International Feminist Solidarity Conference, Manchester
– New Laws for Women’s Rights, London
– One Year On From The Sex Discrimination Act, London
– Planning Conference for the National Conference, Oct., Newcastle on Tyne
– Scottish Women and Media Conference, Edinburgh
– Women in Eastern Europe, Birmingham
– Women Help Yourself, London
– Women and Media, Manchester
– Women and Media, London
– Women and Spirituality (student Christian movement), Wick
– Women Under Apartheid, London
1977
- National WLM conference was held in London
Issues: rape and other forms of violence against women, classism in the WLM, lesbians and child custody, autonomy and separatism, and campaigns such as Women Against Racism and Fascism. 2,500 to 3,000 women attend - ‘Revolutionary feminism’ discussed at conference – now established as a tendency
- The Women’s Room by Marilyn French published in US
- Reclaim the Night march – Edinburgh women held the first Reclaim the Night march in Britain.
The idea had started the previous year in Belgium and Italy and then continued across Europe during the 1970s. 1978 – National WLM conference, Birmingham - Many many conferences in 1977 – see https://feministarchivenorth.org.uk/chron2/page/17/ for details
1978
- 7-9 April – The last national WLM conference was held in Birmingham
Many acrimonious debates. A final demand was added to the first six:
– Freedom for all women from intimidation by the threat or use of violence or sexual coercion regardless of marital status; and an end to the laws, assumptions and institutions which perpetuate male dominance and aggression to women.
Also, amid some controversy, ‘the right to a self-defined sexuality’ was split off and added as a preface to all the demands.
– Scottish National women’s Liberation Conference, Edinburgh
– Welsh National Women’s Liberation Conference, Cardiff - February – Organisation of Women of Asian and African Descent (OWAAD)
Founded to campaign on issues including immigration and deportation. OWAAD functioned as an umbrella organisation supporting smaller groups across the UK. - The Women’s Press founded
- Amrit Wilson’s Finding a Voice – Asian Women in Britain was published
- Again, too many specialist conferences to list here – see https://feministarchivenorth.org.uk/chron2/page/17/
1979
- February – Southall Black Sisters formed
To support all black and Asian women living in the UK through campaigns, providing legal advice and information and offering counselling. - Abortion fights continue against Corrie Bill
- 4 May – Margaret Thatcher became first woman Prime Minister
Unpopular with most women’s liberation activists. Serving until 1990, her 11 years in post make her the longest serving British Prime Minister. Her hard-line politics led to her being known as the ‘Iron Lady’. - See https://feministarchivenorth.org.uk/chron2/page/25/ for list of the very many conferences that year, including:
– Socialist Feminist Conference, London
– National Revolutionary and Radical Feminist Conference, Leeds
– Radical Feminist Conference, London
1980
- 300 Group founded
To campaign and lobby for equal representation of women in Parliament and public office. 300 is roughly half the number of seats in the House of Commons. - Sheba Feminist Press founded
An independent publisher formed to ‘give priority to the work of women writers who continue to be marginalised’.
1981
- 5 September – Greenham Common Peace Camp set up
A group of women from Wales marched to RAF Greenham in Berkshire, protesting against the British government’s decision to site nuclear missiles there. They ‘embraced the base’ and Set up camp there - 5 September – Shocking Pink Collective set up – published 16 issues written by and for young women with an emphasis on topics like contraception, abortion, sexuality, lesbianism / queer issues, violence against women, women culture / music etc., skill sharing (e.g. how to form a band, a women’s group etc.), racism and women’s rights.
1982
-
Greater London Council’s Women’s Committee formed
Through its funding, had big influence on women’s movement
1984
- Women Against Pit Closures formed
During the 1984-85 Miners’ Strike, wives and children of the miners set up support groups
1986
- Shakti Women’s Aid set up by Edinburgh Black Women’s Group
To offer ‘support, advocacy and information to all black / minority ethnic women, children and young people experiencing and/or fleeing domestic abuse from: partners / husbands; ex-partners; other family members. - Lesbian Sex and Sexuality Conference
1987
-
11 June – Diane Abbott first black woman to be elected to House of Commons
1988
- Women in Black formed
A worldwide network of women protesting against war and injustice. Weekly vigils are held in silence by regional groups across the world.